Restless
by Ms Starlight
Summary: Nights of restlessness
1. Zack

Rating: PG-13

Disclaimer: I don't get money for anything I do...I don't even get paid at my job. For some reason I'm into doing unprofitable things.

A/N: So, I'm laying awake one night and outside my window the snow is coming down. I can't help but lay there and wish that it was summer with rain splattering down instead of the snow. This all leads me to an idea when I get up for a drink of water and comment to myself on being restless. This is what you get when I can't sleep...I hope it's worth the hours of rest I lost coming up with it!

BTW: Each chapter will feature a diff. character.

Restless

Chapter 1: Zack 

The curtains billowed gently forward, riding a fragrant summer breeze, and brushed against Zack's sweaty shoulder. His blonde hair was lightly matted to his head, and his body was covered with a damp sheen. Physically, he was satisfied but mentally he was struggling. 

The tangy rain scented air rushed around him, accompanying the sound of crickets outside the window. The woman beside him appeared through the mists of his mind. Her body, which had facilitated him so well moments before, became a source of irritation once as the warmth radiating from her sunk into his muscle, raising his temperature to an uncomfortable level. The night was sticky, and he forced back the urge to push her away in disgust. 

_Bad enough you take advantage of her like a whore, no need to deny her this night's sleep._

He pinched his eyes closed, fighting back the nauseated feeling that rose hotly in his throat. On top of the lanky brunette, he'd never looked in her eyes. Her brilliant azure colored eyes only made it more difficult for him to pretend that she was Max. 

Max didn't feel that way about him; her interests lied in Logan Cale. 

So maybe he didn't feel brotherly toward Max, and maybe he wasn't always around; that didn't mean he didn't care -- didn't _feel_. Zack didn't want to feel, would have liked nothing more than to push Max out of his mind and let sleep overtake him. However, sleep wouldn't come, and she continued to circle his consciousness unabated. 

The woman beside him sighed and shifted her position against him. Outside, the light breeze picked up, causing the rough curtain to connect with the skin of his shoulder again. Despite the heat, a shiver ran through him. He looked down at her, trying not to notice the way the dim light arched through her arched through her brown hair to show hints of blonde and red. He tried not to notice her pale skin, tried to ignore all the ways that she was completely unlike Max. 

_Why do I care? She's made it clear whom she wants, and it's not me. So...why do I give a damn?_

There was no answer to his question except the lonely little songs the crickets under his windowsill were belting out with all their tiny bug hearts. He felt like them sometimes...screaming for all he was worth to never be answered. No one came running when he called, that was _his_ job. 

He was the big brother, the protector. He held everyone together, kept everyone safe. There was no one wandering the country making sure _he_ was safe and happy. The only one he had breathing down his neck was Lydecker, whom he would much rather have taken a few more steps away from. However, he couldn't afford to run from Lydecker and throw his brothers and sisters to the hounds. So, he lived a life of constant fear. 

For everyone -- for her -- he waded through a sea of fire and brimstone. Occasionally, he got burned, but he hid his scars beneath a staunch outer lining that he'd only let one person past. 

Seeing Max outside Manticore, anxiety having over-run his body and mind, he'd given in to all of his impulses. 

_Things are different with her. I can't hide from her -- can't bury this damn emotion. __ _

__Shifting positions, he let his head come to rest against his companion's. He was tired physically, mentally, and emotionally but sleep danced just outside of his grasp. Zack couldn't let go of the stress, worry, and fear so inherent in his life to allow for rest. 

Perhaps a little bitter, he reflected upon his time back at Manticore. He'd gone in Max's place, sacrificed himself for her and received slightly less than a thank you. Oh, she cared, only not in the sense that he wanted. There were times when he was laying in his cell, still high on the drugs they'd given him, that he would close his eyes and envision her. Her image was so real, like he could have reached out and touched her had he wanted to. 

God, he'd wanted to, but whenever he reached for her she disappeared like a phantom into the chilled night. _ _

Zack had stupidly assumed that his pain would make a difference between them, that somehow it would make her see exactly what she meant to him. Still, when he blandly had told her that he felt different about her than the others, she'd only given him a confused glance -- making him immediately want to swallow his tongue. 

The bruises, cuts, scars -- as many inside as out -- served to remind him of what the torture he had endured had brought him. His blood was worthless, would be shed cheaply. To Max, however, Logan's veins might as well have been filled with liquid platinum. _ _

The shots, the hours of agony, the gnawing at his fragile mental state all meant nothing to her. Zack was weary of being the one who had to take pain with a grunt and nothing more. He wanted someone to cradle him when he got hurt, to throw themselves in front of the loaded gun. It was a selfish and lonely wish. Everyone depended upon him, when things went wrong; he had to fix the problem. He could never look to someone else to handle things. 

Worn thin, beaten down, and defeated...he lay in the spongy bed and listened to the crickets sing mournfully to each other. None really communicated, but all were absorbed in their own song. Phrase after phrase, they filled the summer night with their restless symphony. 

The woman rolled away from him then, her fingers digging into the pillow near her cheek. She looked pleasantly content in sleep, quietly confident that nothing could harm her. 

Little did she know, Zack wouldn't be beside her when she awoke. However, for the time being, he let himself lay under the downy covers; his mind on an endless, restless journey.

*okay...that sort of sucked. I promise the next will be better*


	2. Logan

Rating: PG-13

Disclaimer: No $

A/N: You all wouldn't even believe the day I had (suffice it to say that I spent some time at the hospital getting my chin sewn back up) so put up with me if this is a little...weary.

A/N #2: Sorry Ana, maybe sucked was the wrong word to use at the end of the last part. I more meant that it didn't turn out how I had originally envisioned it. Better?

Restless

Part 2: Logan

The midnight sky towered above Logan Cale's window. He sat on the honey colored hardwood floor of his penthouse gazing up at it, momentarily lost in the endless black. Often unable to sleep, he found himself in this position often; only this time, it was different. He wasn't sitting in a wheelchair, a numb ache running through his lower half. No, this time he could feel his feet and wiggle his toes.

Absentmindedly, he gripped his chilled feet in his hands to warm them. It was a good feeling, the cold. He was thankful that he could once again feel the cold bite of a hardwood floor on bare feet. He was thankful that he could rise up to eye level with people once again, no longer needing to bear their downcast eyes filled with pity.

Logan hated all pity but his own. He was known to wallow in his own self-defeat, reviewing unchangeable events in his mind and searching for some thread that could have changed everything.

Still, even with the ability to stand, he couldn't find sleep. True enough, his abilities were more incomplete than he let on, and he suffered more than a few relapses per day. Yet, there was a certain amount of joy in being able to feel again.

He wanted more though, wanted immediate gratification of his wishes. Logan wanted to jump up off the floor and dance, to run along the coast screaming at the top of his lungs. That wasn't possible, nor were many of the other dreams he entertained.

Eyes Only had become the center of his universe and had stayed there for so long that he hardly noticed the ways it effected other aspects of his life. Only weeks ago, however, that wouldn't have mattered to him. Eyes Only had been everything because it was the one thing that he could have, could really control. He wanted Max, wanted her with all of his heart, but he knew that he couldn't have her.

Max was...well, different. There were parts of her that still hadn't moved on past Manticore -- parts of her that still violently innocent. Strange words to put together, violence and innocence, but they seemed to aptly describe Max. She was very much a child inside, hardly even an adult in years. Logan though, he'd had much more time than her.

So, she ran from him, from what was so obviously occurring between them. Bling saw it, Original Cindy saw it...hell, _everyone_ could see it except them. Logan hadn't really been able to see it for a long time, not until he'd gotten out of his chair. Maybe it was the higher vantage point, but the moment he rose up in front of her the dangerous ties between them came clearly into focus. If Max was aware of them, she obviously didn't plan to do anything about it.

The great, all-powerful Eyes Only...done in by a bullet and a woman's smile. Max was beautiful when she smiled, especially when it was genuine and not sarcastic. She didn't smile enough, at least, not around him.

Eyes Only...that stirred up mixed feelings. It was his life, his very identity, but there were parts of that identity that he wished to rid himself of. The stress of his job, being up all night trying desperately to achieve the most unattainable goal was tiresome. He wanted to save the world, somehow change everything for the better. However, his attempts won him nothing but a good night's rest. Presently, that reward evaded him.

A low sigh rumbling from his chest, he closed his eyes and slowly rocked back and forth, attempting to bring a pleasant thought about that would distract him from his darker broodings. Naturally, the image was Max. However, even she produced extra stress in his life. He was mixed up with Manticore now, and he'd made a very powerful enemy. It was bad enough Max had to be on the run, but Eyes Only as well? He wasn't quite as good at evading his enemies as she was -- obviously.

Logan didn't want Max to get hurt because of him. If somehow Manticore were to come after him, and she -- though some odd sense of obligation -- got in the way, they would have her. He didn't know that he could have her death on his conscience. There was a difference between being the one sitting by the trap to warn her and being the one within the trap asking for help.

Opening his eyes, Logan looked back up at the sky. It was cold and empty, even when filled with stars. There was a sense about the sky at midnight that the stars, while embedded in the velvet fabric of the universe, were at free reign to do whatever they pleased. It was much like Max's influence in his life. She was an integral part of everything him -- he just wouldn't be the same Logan Cale without her -- and yet she didn't really need him and was only held in place by his grasp.

At a restless midnight, everything had changed but somehow remained the same. Logan wanted to move fast, to rush in and sweep her off her feet, but that wasn't anything he could do with Max. Held back and frustrated, Logan hid from her as she did from him. He hid his weakness, then worried in private that it would lead to her downfall. He hid his feelings, then struggled to let go of them at night.

Frustrated, disturbed, and decidedly confused, Logan rose up on shaky legs to find his way back to bed. He'd give sleep one more chance for the night, try and find some pleasant dream ferreted away in the back of his mind.

Restless and weary, he searched for peace.


	3. Max

Disclaimer: I don't own any rights to DA

A/N: This little series, all the stories having basically the same theme but from a different perspective, is a little repetitive, isn't it? I don't know how many characters I'm going to do. I originally had plans to do almost all the characters but...we'll see how I feel about it I guess.

A/N #2: Writing these to get over my writer's block worked, and you'll all be happy to know that my new upcoming fic is back on track.

Restless

Part 3: Max

_ I don't sleep...well, sometimes I rest a bit, but I never sleep. I guess that's why I'm always doing this...riding around the streets of Seattle on my baby._

Max wasn't paying attention to where she was going as she turned down any street that struck her fancy. Her mind was elsewhere, coasting on its own ride through the mists of her carefully hidden heart. Rarely did she allow herself to explore the strange organ's depths, but on a humid Seattle night with a salty wind blowing through her hair, she let herself fall headlong into a dangerous thoughtfulness.

_ I can't believe he thinks I'm a liability...that Lydecker's going to get me and I'll just haul off and tell him where everyone is -- which I don't even know in the first place._

Zack -- he was on her mind and in her heart more often than not. She'd never even dreamt that he would hide things from her. The action clearly defined where his priorities were, and she certainly wasn't near the top. Everyone else got the number, could reach him at anytime, except her. She had to sit around, hoping for him to appear out of the shadows.

Max was weary of watching shadows. They hid so much that she had to be aware of. Most people could walk by a darkened corner without even thinking twice. Max walked by a darkened corner and the hair on the back of her neck stood on end. There was always the fear that someone was there just waiting to pounce.

Of course, she'd been trained to assume that at any given moment someone would attack her. Most of the time, if she wasn't paying attention, someone did. If the doctors and soldiers knew her seizures were bad she would become their newest lab rat. She still vividly remembered seeing one of her siblings on the cold, hard autopsy table as the doctors poked and prodded. Lydecker had watched over the whole proceedings, sipping his coffee as if he was considering 13-down in the morning cross-word rather than a human life.

_ Well...somewhat human anyway._

So, Max didn't sleep much. Unconsciousness was a perilous state. When she was asleep, all the things that she tried so hard during the day to hide and suppress were let loose: Lydecker, Zack....Logan.

Logan -- he caused as many problems as Lydecker and Zack put together with his childish grin and naive dreams. She got the feeling that sometimes he really did believe that he could save the world. Maybe sometimes she thought he could too...the man was persuasive with all his big, well crafted sentences and his shining eyes.

She didn't want to care about Logan, indeed was surprised to find that she did. Guys had been like disposable cameras to her -- she used them until they ran-out, then deposited them for a new one. Or, at least, no relationship she'd been in had seemed to last very long, whether or not it was her or him who did the dumping made no difference.

Darren had called her a female fog bank, said that a man never knew where he was with her. Perhaps that was true, Max liked to keep inside of her shell.

Logan though, he was different. He hadn't tried to get her to come out of the shell; he'd climbed right inside. She wasn't sure which approach made her more uncomfortable, but Logan's certainly made her feel more vulnerable. With him so close to everything that she tried so hard to keep hidden from everyone, including herself, he was drudging up thing she didn't want to face. Max didn't want to care, wanted to be able to just shrug her shoulders and walk away. She wanted to hang out at Crash without having Logan tingle at the back of her mind.

_ The guy's like a three year old...always tugging on my sleeve._

Her Ninja roared as she sped up, relishing the feeling of the night air rushing against her face and through her hair. There was nothing quite like riding a motorcycle. On her Ninja nothing could touch her, all her worries tumbled off behind her onto the black pavement. It was the one time she didn't feel restrained; a time when she could close her eyes and pretend she was flying.

It was a strange thing, the very human dream of being able to fly. Her lusting after that very skill made her feel more connected sometimes -- more human. Max was no angel, but darting down the dark streets on her black Ninja no one could have told her so.

She got the feeling that sometimes Logan saw her as an avenging angel, come down to Earth to provide a source of retribution for all the wrongs done to him and to help him acquire his dream. When he looked at her, he didn't see a struggling young girl, but a means to an end -- a tool. He was apt at using her efficiently. Every once in a while, Max would sit back and pretend that he invited her over and cooked her dinner because he had genuine feelings for her. She didn't doubt that he felt something for her, but there was an element to his emotion that was fabricated.

He protected her, held her close because he saw his dream held within her. Max wished she could see what he did; wished she could find such hope in another person. In a way, she supposed she saw some of what she wanted out of life in Logan. He had the resources to reconnect her with her family and the ability to protect her from Lydecker. During the day, the flaws didn't show, but at night Max could clearly see the odd look in Logan's crystalline blue eyes.

_ Not me...would he even like what he saw if he saw the real me?_

She doubted that he would. Max frequently avoided delving deep into herself because she was afraid of what she would find. All the training and hardening she'd gone through at Manticore had done irreversible damage to her, even if she tried her best to look past it. The psychological effects were like a scar that she hid under a mask of outer strength and solidity.

Even in solitude, Max didn't let her walls down.

In fact, the only time her walls crumbled was when she slept.

_ I don't sleep._

As she approached her building, Max slowed down. Original Cindy was out on a date, hoping for the action she never seemed to get. Strange that Cindy would search for it only to never find it and Max would run from the idea. Zack, she was confident, felt more than brotherly toward her. She wasn't at all positive how she felt about his feelings for her. She considered him her brother, and it never ceased to shock her when he would say something that sounded suspiciously like a pick-up line.

Then there was Logan...the tension between them was strong enough that even she couldn't ignore it. Logan couldn't possibly have been oblivious to it. Things between them were starting to get weird. She turned down leaving with Zack and finding more of her siblings for him. Not even just for him, but for her home. When Seattle had become the indisputable center of her universe, she wasn't sure.

Tense, she climbed off the Ninja and started toward home, hoping to fit in an hour or two of sleep before work.

__


	4. Lydecker

Rating: PG

Disclaimer: Don't file a lawsuit against me....I bite...grrrs

A/N: I hate to conform to the Wyoming misconception that the wonderful people at Fox seem to have (Gillette and thus Manticore is a hell of a long way from any forest...actually, Yellowstone is the closest). However, grudgingly, I set this in the...Oh God...I can't say it...okay...I can do this *grits teeth* woods...outside...Manticore. 

A/N #2: The kind of image I'm trying really hard to capture in this comes from a Robert Frost poem you've probably all read at some point or another called _Stopping By Woods on a Snowy Evening_ (see poem at bottom) This one actually turned out pretty short...oh well.

Restless

Part 4: Lydecker

Lydecker looked up at the vast, unending Wyoming sky through a roof of downy covered branches. He'd never been particularly fond of snow or woods in his youth, but as age wore on him and sleep became more and more elusive, he found solace in them with increasing frequency.

The large, crispy flakes clung to the sharp evergreen needles, weighting down the tree branches and making the entire forest seem to weep.

Lydecker would have wept if he thought it would have done him any good.

Manticore was collapsing around him, and he didn't know what to do to save his project. Following the death of his wife and his drinking problem, Manticore had become everything to him. The children -- _his _children -- and the objective were all that mattered.

As his boots crunched through the freshly fallen snow, he could almost see them running in his mind. They were young then, barefoot and dressed in dull, gray smocks. They were careful to keep everything a depressive grayish blue. Bright colors inspired feelings that didn't belong in the minds of Manticore soldiers. Occasionally they would use red for anger, but even that wasn't encouraged.

They weren't supposed to be _able_ to get away.

Raking his fingers through his short, blonde hair he continued through the achingly quiet woods. Nothing around him stirred and only the sound of his lungs dragging in the below zero air disrupted his thoughts. As he huffed out, his breath froze and clouded around him.

He'd been places in his time where a person could breath out and watch the essence of their life freeze and shatter on the ground -- Wyoming winters didn't bother him.

No, what really bothered him was that his own creation was outwitting him. As close as he was to recapturing the lost X-5's, they continued to evade him. At times, he cajoled himself by attributing their brilliance at escape and evade maneuvers to his own teaching abilities. They _were_ the prefect soldiers, they only needed to be harnessed.

They can't run forever.

His relationship with the X-5's was a strange one. They weren't quite people to him, and he could easily watch the weaker ones die in their training. Culling was all-together different from hunting. Lydecker couldn't stand to see his efforts wasted by having his progeny gunned down in the streets of some dusty, broken city. No, he'd rather fix the problem then erase it.

They were like the cattle that still roamed across the Wyoming country side. When the pulse had hit, most of the farmers lost everything. People couldn't afford to buy their beef and their investments had disappeared. A good number of ranchers tore down their fences and abandoned their livestock all together, creating a small, weak wild cow population.

Like the ranchers, Lydecker had put a good portion of his life into his charges. He could withstand sending his "cattle" to the slaughter, but having his herd destroyed was something he couldn't stand for.

Manticore wanted to wipe the radical X-5's off the Earth, ridding themselves of the mistake.

Zack, Jondy, Zane, Max...they were all still out there, waiting to be found. In the meantime, Lydecker found himself back in the pristine backcountry of a largely forgotten state, desperately searching for a means toward sleep. There was little left of Wyoming after the pulse, with an economy based so heavily in agriculture and tourism each city slowly began to fold in upon itself, most of the people choosing to move to more populated areas in search of jobs.

The emptiness suited Lydecker just fine.

Manticore was mere miles from a World War II internment camp for the Japanese called Heart Mountain. When searching for a place to base Manticore, the imprisoned people's description of the area came hauntingly back to him. The vast, unending nothingness had a way of eating at a person's soul, bearing all the things societal webs tried so adamantly to hide. It was oppressive, frightening, and somehow even enlightening at the same time.

Yet, all the space to wander and think brought Donald Lydecker no sense of peace. He wouldn't have peace, not truly, until all of the escaped X-5's were found and reprogrammed.

_ Someday, they'll slip up...and I'll finally be able to rest._

****

Stopping By Woods On A Snowy Evening

By: Robert Frost

Whose woods these are I think I know.

His house is in the village though;

He will not see me stopping here

To watch his woods fill up with snow.

My little horse must think it queer

To stop without a farmhouse near

Between the woods and frozen lake

The darkest evening of the year.

He gives his harness bells a shake

To ask if there is some mistake.

The only other sound's the sweep

Of easy wind and downy flake.

The woods are lovely, dark and deep.

But I have promises to keep,

And miles to go before I sleep,

And miles to go before I sleep.


End file.
